Moving On
by 26hannah26
Summary: Any character POV. Thoughts on 9 11 and moving on. First chapter is very short but there are more for me to add. Rated T because I'm new with this and am a little paranoid! COMPLETE!
1. Chapter 1

A/N I am a fic-virgin so please be gentle if u want to leave a review! There are more chapters so if anyone likes it I will post more. Also you get to choose which characters POV this is from so interpret it as you wish...

September 11th 2001 had started like any other day. The alarm clock rang with the same shrillness it did every morning. I rolled out of bed and stubbed the same toe on the same door jamb like I did every morning, letting out the same curse word. I made the same brand of coffee, that came from the same jar, in the same percolator and then poured it into the same mug as I did every morning.

I walked the same route to work, seeing a few people that I saw every morning, all of them thinking what a normal day it was just the same as I was. I entered the firehouse through the same door we always go through every morning, and then sat down at the same table with the same people, drinking more of the same coffee.

Within ten minutes of walking in, I was getting up from the same table and walking out again with all of the same people, through the same door we came through every morning. And this was the first time any of us realised that the day had just got a whole lot worse than stubbed toes and bad coffee, and things would never be the same again.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N Thanks a bundle for all of the reviews, they made me happy :-)! Anyway here is the next chapter (i promised it would be longer!) and there is one more to go - I am contemplating another chapter but I'll think about it.

After it happened, I couldn't go home. I stayed amongst the dead and the injured for at least a day, wandering, searching for a way to help _someone, _or do something, _anything._

After pulling survivors from the rubble, listening to motivating speeches by various FDNY chiefs, and accepting countless bottles of water and cups of coffee while refusing cookies, sandwiches, doughnuts, food of any kind – just seeing it made me want to retch – I went back to the firehouse where the first words greeting me were 'Go home you need some rest'. This had been said to everyone, but what happens when we get called out – who would rescue you if your house was on fire? Home wasn't an option for me, and besides if I was alone in my apartment, then there would be no one for me to hide tears from like I had been doing for God knows how long. And you could bet if I started crying, then I would never stop.

So after a day of mindless fire fighting and functioning having not slept for 3 days (which isn't the safest way to do it) I reluctantly replaced my boots with sneakers, shut the door of my locker and set off home.

I walked to my apartment consumed by visions of smoke-hazed faces with eyes begging to be rescued from the horror, my ears ringing with screams and desperate pleas. I even managed to walk straight past the entrance to my building. After backtracking I wearily climbed the 3 flights of stairs, suddenly overcome by tiredness.

Reaching the door and fumbling for my keys I breathed a heavy sigh, startling myself a little in the quiet.

As I let myself in I removed my jacket and flopped down on the sofa. I thought I'd appreciate the quiet in the empty house, hoped it would help me forget the roar of the buildings as they collapsed or the frantic screams. But it only reminded me of the dead calm in the aftermath, no one dared speak, or even couldn't. Silence I had never heard before, and I prayed I would never hear again. I closed my eyes tight, hoping somewhat foolishly that it would help me blank out images of suits I saved, suits I didn't. I automatically felt guilty for seeing those innocent people as an outfit, only _seeing _them, not really knowing they were even there. They were just part of the job. I felt guilty for seeing people outside praying, having stopped in the street and dropped to their knees, and I remembered how I selfishly hoped they would pray for me and the others going in to save the ones they were really praying for.

I'd never been a praying man, but that day, and now too, I had an urge to jump up from the couch and throw myself down with my hands clasped together, an urge to scream to Jesus. It was ironic really. I wanted to pray, but how in earth could there be a God if something like this could happen? If I didn't believe in God then, I certainly didn't now.

Now I did jump from the couch, hoping any movement on my part would shake these thoughts from my mind. Running my hands through my filthy hair filled with dust and soot, I remembered a priest I had seen what seemed a lifetime ago but in reality was 3 days – my sense of time was so screwed up. I must have seen that guy shake hands with every fire-fighter who left the site. When he held out his hand for mine, I'm sure I hesitated, even if it was only for a split second. Then he blessed my soul.

I felt like telling him I'd just had my soul ripped out. I had seen countless dead people, thousands injured but I don't remember helping who would now be dead and it was all my fault. Telling him I'd seen a pregnant woman collapse in front of me, but before I could get to her I was being dragged backwards, out into the light, the air, the calm, all of these things hitting me at 100 miles an hour. But he would have just stared, given me a look that could mean anything but I'd never ask what for fear of seeming stupid. And he would have just wrenched his hand from my sweaty grip and moved on to the next guy, maybe pushing me aside a little. And then forget me. But I would never forget. The whole country, hell, the whole _world_ would never forget – but I would try with all my might.


	3. Chapter 3

It was three months later and I was sitting on the subway, going to visit a friend from high school in Uptown Manhattan.

I heard no voices – everyone was sitting in silence. I had always felt uncomfortable sitting in silence since 9/11, but as I sat and listened, waiting for someone to make even the slightest noise, I realised that this wasn't silence. Silence as I had known it was eerie and deathly – is it really any wonder it makes me uncomfortable?

I listened for the first time in what seemed like forever. That was when I heard not silence, filling every square inch of the train, coming towards me, swallowing me up so I am never to be seen again – very similar to how I felt at ground zero except what was swallowing me up was more sinister, a mixture of smoke and dust and flames.

No, I didn't hear nothing, I heard _something_: the click of the train on the track,

soothing me no end; the rustle of newspapers or pages of best-selling novels being turned frantically and with baited breath, awaiting the next thrill or surprise written by Stephen King or, in the case of the woman next to me, JK Rowling; absent-minded coughs from a school girl opposite me; a hip-hop beat blaring from someone's headphones; a hushed 'excuse me' from a polite-looking young man in a suit after nearly falling into the lap of a stern older man whose broad shoulders were clad in an old wrinkled leather jacket.

And then I realised a smile had crept onto my face. Not a smile seen on birthdays or Christmas, but a knowing smile a child wears when they know a secret. Then I noticed the odd looks coming at me and went back to fiddling with a plaster on my thumb. I felt like I was finally moving on, getting closer to my old self.


End file.
